


those were our times

by arya_B



Series: the death of a family in seven steps [2]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Childhood Memories, Cousins, Dysfunctional Family, Family Feels, Gen, Siblings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-18
Updated: 2017-06-18
Packaged: 2018-11-15 18:47:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11237022
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arya_B/pseuds/arya_B
Summary: Andromeda reminisces about her family. About everything they were, and everything they should have been. One day, they were happy. One day, they could've been happy ever after.





	those were our times

**Author's Note:**

> Leave it to me to still be suffering over the Black family
> 
> If there's still anyone out there waiting for the end of "such fragile broken things", please know that I haven't abandoned that fic, I'm just having a hard time writing the characters post-War. Also, consider this like a side fanfic for that one.
> 
> And I think it's worth mentioning, I love Ted Tonks dearly, but I also like to explore the possibility that Andromeda has never loved him as much as he loved her. I always like to explore all the sides Andromeda might have.

We were magnificent.

I’m not supposed to say that. Not now, when everything has crashed and burned. When everything that we were has become a wreck. When my family has fallen apart, and when I have become their enemy.

But it wasn’t always like this. I wasn’t always Andromeda Tonks, the blood traitor.  
One day, I too was a Slytherin. One day, I too was a Black. Once upon a time. I was the happiest girl alive, and I loved my family, more than anything in this world.

Once upon a time, we were five children. Three girls, two boys.

The pictures we took back then (the ones that are all burnt now) always had three children smiling, two serious. It wasn’t a determined thing, it wasn’t anyone’s part. It was just something we did, naturally. Like a tradition that we didn’t even have to think about to keep. We liked traditions, they made us who we were.

Our lives were the garden, the dinner nights, away from the adults. The old family legends, Hogwart’s tales, dreams of a golden future. Our lives were so much better than anything that came afterwards. Our lives were free of war, and just the slightest hint of sadness would run on the back of our minds. Once upon a time, it was us against the world. And nothing in the world was capable of defeating us.

I guess that it was why we have defeated ourselves.

Once upon a time we were so much bigger than the sum of our parts. We weren’t just Andromeda, Bellatrix, Sirius, Narcissa and Regulus. We were the Black cousins. We were each other’s best friends. 

Even after Gryffindor. Sirius won’t admit it now, but even after his first year at Hogwarts, we were still us. And we were the best that ever was.

Once upon a time, real love run between our veins. Between Bella and Narcissa and me and Sirius and Regulus. All of us, drowned in our love. None of us ever meant to hurt the other, we promised we never would. We all believed that. We laughed at the future, at anything that thought it could face us. Nothing would be able to break us.

Than we did. As our love turned to apathy, to indifference, to hate, we destroyed what nothing else in the world could destroy. And I’m not sure how that happened, I just know that now there’s a hole in me. A hole where the five of us used to be. A hole that nothing (no Ted, no future, no promised happiness) can fill, ever again.

But it wasn’t always like this. One day I had a real family and no matter how dark was the storm that had always been there, on the corner of our lives waiting to take us down, we shined. We were golden.

On those lost moments, we were perfection.


End file.
